


better off (with you)

by Teroe



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: And snow, Childhood Sweethearts, Clexmas18, F/F, literally one of the best combos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-26
Updated: 2018-12-26
Packaged: 2019-09-27 13:39:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17162987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Teroe/pseuds/Teroe
Summary: After so many years, maybe they've finally earned that maybe someday.orthe childhood sweethearts reunited after years apart au





	better off (with you)

 

 

2008

 

They cancel school at 5am. Clarke gets up at six, groggy and on autopilot as she pads down the stairs in her fluffy slippers and matching festive sweats. Abby smiles at her from the kitchen table still in her scrubs from a late night shift, the old coffee machine groaning from its spot on the counter, and promptly tells her to go back to bed. Clarke doesn’t need to be told twice.

 

She wakes up for real around 9 to the sound of her phone, vibrating under her pillow, and she digs fruitlessly for it in her half asleep state. The screen is bright under the cover of the blankets, but among the three or so missed texts, she sees Lexa’s name and her mouth stretches in a wide goofy smile.

 

Lexa (7:49am): Snow day?

 

It says, and Clarke knows beyond its simplicity the answer to such a question.

 

(9:13am) Please

 

Three minutes later, the only thing Lexa texts back is a smiley face, and that is more than enough. Clarke feels her heartbeat in her chest, firm and unsteady, and she doesn't have to wonder what it means. 

 

* * *

 

Sam barks, his rough old woofs echoing from the foyer and Clarke is up from her little impromptu spot at the coffee table in the living room faster than her legs can keep up. They tangle under her and she catches herself on the seat of the couch and starts again. She slides into the hall, and Abby’s head turns at the disruption in her peripheral.

 

“Your homework, young lady,” Abby says, voice following in a strange echo as Clarke snags her jacket from the coat hanger.

 

She shoves her arms through the sleeves. “Lexa said she’d help me,” Clarke calls back, shooing Sam away from the door so she can open it. He does so begrudgingly.

 

The cold hits her first. Right in the chest as she takes in the first lungful of air. It nips at her cheeks, her neck, and she scrunches her shoulders towards her ears at the gust of wind that curls into the open space. Drafts of snow blown onto the porch collect in piles in the corners and she feels the bite of it at the back of her heels the second she steps down and the powder sneaks into her slippers. It only lasts a second.

 

Lexa is just a shape as she makes her way down the road, bundled in her bulky dark coat and scarf. The street is empty behind her, the travel ban long in effect as the snow continues its steady downfall, reaching the middle of her boots. It clings in clumps to her laces as she climbs over the ever-growing bank of snow at the end of the driveway, courtesy of the plows. She trudges up the rest of the driveway, hands stuffed deep into her pockets, nose buried into her scarf, and the longer it takes the more Clarke finds it harder not to smile.

 

There’s a split moment about ten feet from the porch when Lexa looks up, catching Clarke’s stare. She exhales this long breath that billows in front of her, and Clarke finds herself stuck on Lexa’s red nose and flushed cheeks, the way her shoulders relax at the sigh.

 

Lexa kicks her boots against the steps before joining Clarke on the landing of the porch, and this close Clarke can see the curl to the corner of Lexa’s lips as she wets them. They look chapped and a little blue, but the short laugh Lexa let’s out at Clarke’s staring makes her heart flutter.

 

“Hey,” Lexa says, and it’s soft, an exhale. Clarke reaches her fingers towards Lexa’s open coat and the sweater beneath, grasping at the hem and tugging her closer.

 

Lexa hums, eyes focused on the way Clarke tethers herself. There’s snow caught in the curls of Lexa’s hair, settled on the curve of her lashes, and Clarke thinks, yeah, heaven looks something like this.

 

“You wanna help me with my calc homework?”

 

Lexa glances up and then back down, and her smile spreads. “Not particularly no.”

 

Clarke pinches her hip and Lexa yelps, but it’s followed by infectious laughter that builds gradually in Lexa’s chest, and Clarke hangs on to every sound.

 

 

2018

 

It snows on Christmas eve, soft drifts and slow, melting upon contact. Clarke is more than familiar with it, and even in spite of the seven or so years she's spent on the west coast, she can't say she misses it as she drags her suitcase up onto the covered porch, though the door, and then into the foyer of her childhood home, her carry on duffle slung over her shoulder. It smells like Christmas, at least. Cinnamon and spices and pine and she takes a moment to breathe it in.

 

“Clarke?”

 

“In here,” she calls back, setting her stuff aside so she can take off her jacket.

 

Abby peers around the entryway. “You’re earlier than expected.”

 

“Yeah.” Clarke pulls her arms from the sleeves, folds the jacket over her arm. “Got lucky I guess.”

 

“Raven got in touch with me. She told me to tell you that her and a bunch of your old friends will be at Charlie’s for drinks, if you wanted to stop by. It’s holiday themed and there’ll be live music--”

 

“Oh, uh.” Clarke shrugs, looks down at her jacket to pluck at the frays. “I don’t know. I got off a double and took the first flight out…”

 

“Whatever you want, honey. I’ve got hot chocolate and kahlua and some leftover lasagna...”

 

“All at once, right?”

 

Abby gives her a look, but Clarke grins. “I’ve got an overnighter in an hour, but I’ll be home by nine for our usual, yeah?”

 

Clarke lets the smile take hold. Slow at first but it feels welcome. Deserved. Halfway through her residency at the hospital and drained doesn’t even begin to cover it. She needs this and she’ll either relax or die trying.

 

“Thank you, mom.”

 

“Anytime.” Abby smiles. “You know where everything is.”

 

Clarke carries her things upstairs after Abby returns to the kitchen, and sometime between unpacking her things she hears Abby call out a goodbye from downstairs. It’s quiet after that, and by seven o’clock Clarke has decided the last thing she wants is to spend Christmas Eve alone, so she dresses in something that isn’t sweats and calls an uber.

 

Charlie’s is five minutes into town. This small local bar two roads over from her old high school. It’s small compared to the ones back in San Fran, but cozier in a way only nostalgia can bring. A counter spans the far wall, nearly packed, decorated with Christmas lights. Four bartenders pour drinks and refills as fast as their hands can manage among the chaos. Tables are packed and there's even a couple people playing pool, and Clarke can't remember the last time she's seen it this busy. 

 

Raven, along with a handful of others hog the far left side, pushed together to make room for the other patrons who mingle at the bar.

 

“You made it!” Raven exclaims the moment Clarke steps closer to the bar, and she accepts the crushing hug with a surprising amount of grace. “I didn’t think you would.”

 

“I haven’t been able to see you guys in years, you really think I’m going to blow you off?” Clarke mutters into Ravens hair, trying to tug off her gloves with her hands caught in between.

 

“No, but I’d understand if you did.” Raven pulls away. “How are you though? You look tired as shit.”

 

“Thank you for that vote of confidence Raven, I feel like shit.”

 

“The flight?” Raven asks, and there’s something in those words that makes Clarke wonder if they’re supposed to mean something different.

 

Clarke stuffs her gloves into her pockets. “And just about everything else.”

 

“Yeah I feel that.”

 

Raven drags her over to the bar, sits her between Monty and Octavia after hugs have been given and received. Clarke orders a glass of eggnog and rum and the band plays lite rock versions of Christmas carols to the tune of clinking glass and laughter. It feels warm at least, and Clarke enjoys being smothered in the middle of friends as she sips her drink, Raven’s weight against her back. She talks animatedly with her neighbors, and Clarke enjoys not having anything to say.

 

It’s a couple drinks later when her mind wanders. There’s a comfortable buzz settled behind her eyes and the band plays something catchy and her knee bounces to the rhythm and it's then that the universe decides to mess with her. She turns towards the entrance when something familiar enters the edge of her sight and she very nearly spits up her drink.

 

Lexa looks the same, but also in a certain light, not at all. She brushes the snow from her jacket and hair, and Clarke knows she’s staring. It’s been years since she’s seen her, not since those attempts at long distance their first year in college. The midnight trips, long plane rides and early mornings in a foreign bed, but so very warm. It’s easy to forget how much a body can miss someone until they’re right in front of you, and Clarke quickly turns around again, hands curled around her drink.

 

The image nags at her though, pulls and tugs at the edges of her brain until all she can do is let it consume her and it’s almost like Lexa is waiting. Similarly dumbfounded and perhaps equally embarrassed, her mouth is open slightly in what must be minor shock, and Clarke doesn’t know what to make of the situation besides to wave.

 

 _She waves_. This stupid, awkward, barely there wave that shouldn’t even make up a movement let alone be a greeting to her childhood sweetheart, and Clarke snaps her arm down so fast it's a miracle nothing comes back broken. The dread that follows, however, sinks into the pit of her gut and blooms.

 

Lexa doesn’t wave back.

 

“I gotta go.”

 

“Go?” Raven says, but she’s not fast enough. Clarke is already up and out of her seat.

 

The exit isn’t an option, for the primary reason that it is also the entrance Lexa just walked through, and Clarke weaves through the crowd by the bar towards the restrooms. It’s only among the sanctity of the fluorescent lights and that almost hum as they work that the initial panic subsides. Though it does little to make her feel any less of an idiot.

 

She thunks her head against the closed door and counts back slowly from ten, forcing out a long exhale from the pits of her lungs. It makes her feel a little better, but the realization of her circumstances is hard to ignore locked in the bathroom of her hometown bar. Clarke debates the pros and cons of waiting five minutes and then scooting out the back door, but kicks herself for the thought.

 

It’s only Lexa, after all. Lexa with her soft hands and quiet smile—Lexa, who stood up to a bully twice her size in kindergarten for her. The same Lexa who kissed her in fourth grade and said the word love like it meant something more than just a concept far too incomprehensible for a nine-year-old. And Clarke had believed it too. Maybe she hadn’t known what it meant at the time but she had felt it and that of course made it real.

 

And it had been. Real. Nothing would change that. She didn’t particularly want to, anyway. They lasted. Or at least they could have and perhaps that’s what hurt most.

 

She isn’t all that surprised that she spots Lexa within seconds of exiting the bathroom. Picked her apart from the crowd like her heart was looking for her and Clarke quickly stomps that thought before it has a chance to run away. Yes, it’s christmas eve, and she’s lonely, and of course Lexa still wears the leather bracelet Clarke made for her in freshman year, but she’s busy, she has a career and a path and that does not include emotionally compromising flings or rekindling of past loves.

 

Doesn’t mean she can’t say hi, though, her traitorous heart thinks, and before she knows it she’s picked up the pieces of her dignity and moved.

 

Lexa notices. Of course she does. As if she hadn’t been subtly eyeing the bathroom area since Clarke disappeared in its vicinity. Clarke tries not to let the familiarity of Lexa lull her. It’s been years, eight—almost nine to be exact, and despite the similarities, people change, but even in the orange glow of the bar, Lexa still watches her like something holy.

 

“Hi,” Lexa says, and it‘s this one word syllable spoken in some breathy sigh and it shouldn’t surprise Clarke that she’s been beaten at her own game.

 

Lexa has shucked off her jacket, draped it over the back of her chair. This loose button down tucked into slim jeans, and Clarke gets stuck on the rolled-up sleeves and that darn bracelet she spent four hours browsing YouTube learning how to make. It looks well worn and frayed, but Clarke thinks a more suitable term would be loved.

 

“Hey,” is her response, delayed as she drags her eyes back up to Lexa’s face. That looks the same. Maybe a little more mature, but her eyes hold the same quiet intensity—the same sharpness of her jaw. “It’s been ages.”

 

“More than a couple years, yes,” Lexa says, her eyes searching Clarke’s face. And then a little more softly, “I didn’t know you were back in town.”

 

“I didn’t know you were either,” Clarke replies. Last she knew, Lexa was situated at a prestigious firm in New York, and with what the years following their high school career told them, neither were prone to days off. “How’ve you been?”

 

Lexa doesn’t answer and for a moment Clarke thinks she’s been ignored, but Lexa blinks once, twice, and clears her throat. “Busy.”

 

“I can imagine,” Clarke says. “Can I sit?”

 

“Please.” Lexa gestures to the seat next to her, an invitation, and Clarke slips awkwardly into it.

 

“Can I get you ladies anything?” says a passing bartender. Clarke glances at him and then back at Lexa.

 

Lexa shakes her head, a tall dark brew near her elbow, and Clarke could swear there’s the smallest of smiles on her lips.

 

“Uh, cranberry and vodka,” she says finally, and with a nod the bartender walks off. When Clarke turns back Lexa’s watching, and the smile is most definitely there. Clarke fiddles with her sweater. “How’s… New York, right?”

 

Lexa nods, her eyes not leaving Clarke. “I…” she trails off, and Lexa gives a subtle shake her head. “I’m... I'm sorry, I missed that. Can you say it again?”

 

There’s something about the whole situation that makes Clarke laugh. “Lexa,” she says, her voice a tad lower, admonishing. She could swear a blush touches Lexa’s cheeks, but maybe it’s just the lights.

 

“What?”

 

“Are we really doing this?”

 

“Doing what.”

 

“This.” Clarke gestures between them. She doesn’t feel the need to elaborate. “You look good.”

 

“Thank you.” Lexa angles herself closer. “So do you.”

 

“Cranberry and vodka, miss.”

 

Clarke looks away, offering a small thank you in return for the drink, and the man smiles before moving on. She twirls the glass and takes a sip, and the clink of the ice cubes rings dull against the sides. Lexa takes a sip of her own and then places it back on her napkin.

 

“How are you?” Lexa asks a moment later, just loud enough to be heard over the noise, and Clarke knows to take it personally despite the vagueness. It’s in the warmth of her eyes, the way Lexa scoots incrementally closer until their knees brush.

 

They might not have been in touch much over the last years but it was not for want of trying. Their split had been a mutual decision, and it had been for the best. Their careers came first.

 

“Tired,” Clarke says finally, and she runs her index finger absently over the lip of her glass. “It’s been a long time.”

 

Lexa says nothing. She shifts, resting her left arm on the bar, palm down, and Clarke has to tell herself it’s not an offer.

 

“You still have it.”

 

Lexa’s head tilts just so, this pinch between her brows as her eyes search Clarke’s face. It’s a second or two before the realization dawns, and Lexa glances to her left, her sight settling on the corded leather braid secured around her wrist. She moves the hand to her lap.

 

“Why wouldn’t I have it?”

 

“‘Cause we’re no longer together.”

 

And Lexa’s shoulders drop. “Clarke.”

 

And it’s said so gently—the sound of her name on Lexa’s lips after so many years—that her heart stutters in her chest. Clarke looks up, catching the green of Lexa’s eyes highlighted by the multi-colored fairy lights strewn through the banisters. Far off there’s the clink of glasses and laughter and the band as it swings into "all I want for christmas” and if Clarke could fit all times she’s been rendered speechless by that one syllable of her name—honestly it makes her a little angry. Sends that little gremlin in her stomach into a fit because how dare she still have this effect.

 

“Why are you like this?” Clarke says with a shake of her head, pulling her drink towards her for another sip. It’s not angry. Nor is it accusatory or malicious. A statement. Rhetoric in a way that has Lexa leaning back in her chair. Quiet, yet pensive. She does nothing about her knee though, still touching Clarke’s.

 

“I’ve missed you,” Lexa says. Those three words hang between them, a taboo, but it feels like a relief to hear it.

 

“You ass,” Clarke murmurs affectionately, and Lexa smiles something soft for her.

 

Lexa moves her knee, bumps it purposefully against Clarke’s a couple times, and Clarke sets aside her drink to still the movement. She keeps her hand there long after Lexa has deemed it fit to stop.

 

“You really think it’s doable? Us?” Clarke says, and the vulnerability she feels at voicing that question digs itself into her gut. She doesn’t know whether to find the tenderness in Lexa’s eyes comforting or not.

 

“How long do you have?”

 

“I’m here for a couple days. Back out to San Fran before the new years.”

 

“Then we have plenty of time.”

 

“You mean long enough to get me to miss you when you leave.”

 

“The 29th,” is all Lexa says, and it’s an ultimatum and a question all in one. She leans in close from her recline and for a split second Clarke thinks she’s going to be kissed. But she isn’t, and it’s perhaps tonight’s biggest disappointment. “Where are you staying?”

 

“My mother’s,” Clarke says. Lexa’s eyebrow ticks upwards, and Clarke lightly shoves her shoulder. The resulting chuckle is music to her ears. “Don’t judge me.”

 

“What are we, in high school?”

 

“I wish we were,” she mutters, almost to herself, but there's a tenseness to Lexa's hand and Clarke knows she’s heard it.

 

“Can I drive you home?” Lexa asks and there’s a second part that Clarke knows goes unsaid.

 

Clarke looks around, finds the group of others still at the other side of the bar. She catches Raven stealing glances around Monty, wide eyed and more than a little confused. Her friend mouths something Clarke can’t make out, and a part of her doesn’t want to find out, so she rifles through her wallet and places a couple of bills on the counter as Lexa gathers her jacket, puts it on. She reaches back for Lexa’s hand without thinking.

 

Lexa lets her lead. Clarke pulls her determinedly across the bar floor and by the pool tables until they’re outside. It’s still snowing, and they both pause outside the door for a moment before Lexa tugs her toward the small parking lot. Snow already covers Lexa’s car in a thick sheet nearly an inch high, and she uses her arm to quickly wipe it away as Clarke clambers into the passenger seat. Lexa joins her not too long later.

 

“Did you bring a jacket?” Lexa says, eyeing Clarke as she digs the keys from her pocket and blindly inserts them into the ignition. The car rumbles to life.

 

Clarke shivers in the coldness of Lexa’s car, hands tucked under her armpits. “I did.” Her coat and gloves are still on the chair beside Raven, but to be honest she’d forgotten about it entirely.

 

Lexa’s hand drops from the steering wheel and she glances out the window towards the bar and then back. “I can grab them.”

 

“No. No, it’s fine. I promise. There’s nothing in it besides my gloves and Raven won’t leave it.”

 

Lexa seems unconvinced but goes along with it anyway. “Okay.”

 

The ride is short. Five minutes tops, but it’s enough to bring back memories Clarke thought she forgot. Or maybe buried. Walking pressed closed to Lexa’s side, her arm around Lexa's waist and stealing kisses between each pass of cars. The late night walks home from the library, heavy backpacks and taking turns carrying the weight. Before Clarke realizes it, Lexa has pulled into the driveway of her mother’s house. The windshield wipers pass back and forth, clearing the snow before it sticks.

 

“I’ll walk you,” Lexa says, taking the keys out. The wipers stop and the car goes still and Clarke sits in the passenger seat, watching as Lexa pulls herself from the car. It’s a second or two before she follows.

 

Clarke catches up quickly, and they’re side by side up the long, little path from the driveway to the porch, shoulder to shoulder and Clarke can feel the warmth of her against the growing wind and flurries. But halfway up the steps of the porch Clarke notices the absence immediately.

 

She looks over her shoulder and finds Lexa there at the bottom of the steps, hands in her pockets of her jacket. The snow collects in her hair, and her cheeks are already red, and it’s just the lights glittering on the porch but everything seems to shine.

 

Clarke decides then that thinking is overrated. She turns around, and there’s an almost imperceptible widening to Lexa’s eyes as she watches Clarke close the distance between them. Clarke’s hands cup Lexa’s cheeks and they’re cold, but Clarke is blessed with hearing the subtle intake of breath as Lexa has to tilt her head back to kiss her.

 

It’s slow, and almost like melting. Clarke feels it in the tip of her fingers and any remaining space is quickly smothered as Lexa presses herself closer like she’s desperate to feel.

 

When Clarke finally pulls away, it’s just enough to see Lexa’s face and closed eyes and the familiar pinch between her brows. A mix of hesitant and hopeful but unwilling to see which. Clarke steals another quick kiss instead and Lexa doesn’t move besides to trail after her when Clarke pulls away again.

 

“Don’t tell me you’re not coming inside,” Clarke says, and she can feel the tilt of Lexa’s smile against her lips. Her hands move from Lexa’s cheeks to the edges of her sweater and then underneath towards soft skin and that flare of warmth.

 

Lexa holds tight. “I would love to.”

 

* * *

 

Christmas morning is warm. Tucked under the covers and pressed close to Lexa’s naked back, there’s not much to think about besides the beat of her pulse under Clarke’s mouth. She’s pleasantly sore, and in no rush to move, so when Lexa shifts, turning to tuck her face into Clarke’s neck (this long inhale that escapes in a sigh), it’s an easy thing to let her.

 

The small twin bed, on the other hand, would beg to differ.

 

Clarke feels the press of lips not too long later, lingering and sluggish but with a pressure full of promises. Clarke lets it last until her skin is tingly and her neck undoubtedly littered in marks.

 

“Snow day?” Lexa asks when her mouth is no longer busy. The warmth of her breath scatters over the coolness left by her tongue and Clarke can’t help the shiver that skates down her spine.

 

“Please.”

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> an addendum:
> 
> Abby walks in at 9 on the dot to Lexa making coffee in her kitchen wearing an old pair of clarke's booty shorts and a tank that probably shows more than it should. they both scream. or abby does. lexa yelps, spooked, and drops her recently poured mug full of coffee all over the granite counter-tops. upstairs, clarke shrinks further into her sheets bc she somehow forgot to disclose the very important detail of when her mother told her she'd be back from work. it's a mess.
> 
> thank you for reading!


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